The Rest of the Story

What, you thought that was it?? So did I, but apparently my body had/has other plans for me. But before I get to it, I just want to thank everyone for the comments and emails last week. This has been a very tough time for my family and I, and I sincerely appreciate each and every one of you. I'm not usually a sappy person but I was brought to tears several times. I needed it.

Moving on, just so you have been warned, this part gets a tad graphic, if you are the slightest faint of heart you might want to skip this post all together. It's super long and detailed, but it's what happened, and even though I want to put it at the back of my mind, I never want to forget what happened.

So obviously Tuesday was rough, Wednesday was a little better emotionally and then Thursday I woke up with a sense of calm. I just felt better about the situation,and I started to realize that this did happen for a reason, whatever reason that is I'll never know but it happened and I was dealing with it. We knew we were lucky to still have one very special baby. Fast forward to late Thursday night. I still had the bleeding on and off, and I wasn't worried because both Doctors told me that would probably happen for a while. What they didn't prepare me for was what happened next. I woke up at about 3 AM to some mild cramping. Again I wasn't worried as this was something to be expected. Then the cramping got worse, then I noticed a pattern. This wasn't cramping I was having full blown contractions. Not the kind that you generally experience during a full term labor, but they were there, coming every 4 minutes or so and lasting about 30 seconds. I knew I should have called the doctor at that point, but I also kept thinking that if I just laid on my side and drank some water they might go away. They finally did and about 6:00 AM I was able to get comfortable enough to go back to sleep. Somehow my husband slept through this. I woke him up a time or two, but being the man he is he turned right over and went back to sleep.

When I got up again I noticed I had to go to the bathroom (surprise) and this is when it happened. I peed and felt something strange come out, I thought it was some sort of clot, but when I realized that it was not in the toilet but still attached to my body, I knew, I just knew. My baby, my sweet baby was hanging there between my legs. I did not know what to do, I wanted to scream, I wanted to throw up, I wanted to get the scissors and cut it away but I quickly got my senses and yelled for my husband. I told him what I thought had happened, he didn't believe me and I gradually got the courage up to let him take a look. It was indeed our baby. At this point I could only hope it was the one that had already passed away. By looking at it I knew it had to be. I paged my Dr. (thankfully he gave me his pager number earlier because the office was not open yet and I had no way of getting in touch with him, and I really didn't feel like dealing with the on call Dr. at 8:15 in the morning.) and I had to sit there until he called back. I had no idea what to do. He called back about 5 minutes later and wanted us to come to his office right away, but I could tell that he had no idea what to say to me. At this point I had no idea how were going to do this. So I put on a hefty pad, laid a washcloth in my underwear and gently placed the baby in a place where I would not sit on it. I had to touch it, and I can't even describe it. I don't want to. I don't want to think about that very moment ever again, but I know I will because it is forever etched into my mind. It was the most uncomfortable and nauseating car ride I have ever had in my life. We couldn't get there fast enough.

By the time we did I started to get undressed and it came loose, so I gently left it on the washcloth, laid a paper towel over it and sat on the chair and waited. I know we weren't in there for that long but it seemed like forever. My Dr. came in told me how sorry he was that I had to witness that, gave me a big hug and then got to work. He wanted to make sure I wasn't dilated, so after probing and prodding he determined that if I had dilated over night, I wasn't anymore. Good sign, good sign. He then got out the ultrasound machine and proceeded to do the uncomfortable kind to double check the status of my cervix and the status of Baby A. At this point I was going through my 6th, yep 6th ultrasound. My insurance company loves me I'm sure. The first thing we see is no movement from my good baby. Although the last two times I've seen this baby on screen it's been active as hell, he reassures me and tells me not to worry. Babies do rest sometimes. All I see is the baby laying in the same position that Baby B was in on Tuesday. He doesn't see an immediate heartbeat. I looked at him with tears and my eyes said "it's over isn't it,", my husband said nothing, and the doctor kept saying "this isn't supposed to happen this way, this isn't supposed to happen." And then silence, more prodding, and as I'm closing my eyes I hear him say "hold on, hold on, hold on. There's heart motion right there." And at that point I saw the most beautiful thing, heart motion and hands moving.

So, as of right now my little fighter is holding strong. I go back in a week for my 16 week checkup and hopefully we will hear a heartbeat at that point and we can move on. Until then I can only keep praying that things will work out.

I just wish someone would have prepared me for that. No one, NO ONE should have to go through what I went through. I do however think that it has helped me put some closure on that situation. I was able to see, and touch the baby that I was lucky enough to have for 14 weeks. I was able to see it's head, eyes, ears, legs, arms and even butt. It had the cutest little butt. I say it because I was not willing to look and see what the sex was. It didn't matter to me anyways. All I know is we have one strong healthy fighter left, and we will never forget the one that left us too soon. I know that he/she is up watching us and taking care of us. Right now that seems to be the glue that is holding me together.